Friday theme / Show & tell: The Light of the City

When you read this I will be in Sweden! My plane landed at 07.35 this morning in Copenhagen, if there were no delays and I didn’t miss my connecting flight in Newark yesterday… I don’t know when I will have time to update the blog but below is my interpretation of the last Friday theme before the summer break. Annika and Desiree have chosen great themes for June!

The Light of the City

Carlsberg by night in Copenhagen

An evening walk on Paseo La Princesa in the Old San Juan

Old San Juan by night

La Ventana al Mar by dusk

The beach in Condado by dusk

Saltistjejen‘s view in NYC

Entering Toronto by dusk

And a poolside wedding in the evening

I probably won’t have time to check the other Friday bloggers’ interpretations of the theme today but I will do it as soon as possible.
Anki, Anna, Annika, Christel, Curieux, Desiree, Emma, Erica, IamAnnika, IngaBritt, Jemaya, Lena W, Leopardia, Mais-oui, Marie, Mia D, Millan, Minerva, Moster Mjölgumpa, Musikanta, Nilla, Norrsken & Stjärnfall, Petra H, Saltis, Sara, Simone, Sparkling, Strandmamman, Taina, Under Ytan, Victoria V and Västmanländskan.

What to choose, what to choose…

My meal choices for today’s flight to Copenhagen:

TO BEGIN
Warm roasted nuts with your preferred cocktail or beverage

HOT APPETIZER CART
A demitasse of morel mushroom soup accompanied by a grilled rosemary shrimp skewer and beef empanada, with Amazon sauce

SALAD and warm breads
Mesclun salad mix and romaine lettuce with roasted yellow tomato, cherry tomato, red onion and fresh mozzarella cheese
Your choice of Italian herb vinaigrette or creamy Thousand Island dressing
Freshly baked garlic bread and assorted rolls with butter

MAIN COURSES
The Chef’s Selection
Grilled tenderloin steak with chimichurri sauce, grilled carrots, mushrooms, red bell pepper, broccoli florets
and spicy rice with corn, jalapeño peppers, sour cream and cheese

Herbed breast of Chicken with creamy mushroom sauce, grilled yellow squash, zucchini, red bell pepper and sweet plantains

Poached salmon and Lobster with shellfish sauce, presented over steamed jasmine rice, with grilled cherry tomato and green asparagus spears

Pasta Bowl
Tortelloni with marinara sauce, eggplant and bean confit, fresh mozzarella cheese and freshly grated Parmesan cheese

FRUIT AND CHEESE cart
Select American and imported cheeses, grapes, assorted gourmet crackers and bread, served with Port wine

DESSERT CART
Vanilla ice cream with choice of toppings or an assortment of petite pastries
Fresh gourmet roasted regular and decaffeinated coffee made exclusively for Continental Airlines or tea with your choice of milk or lemon

pre-arrival REFRESHMENT
A selection of juices
Fresh seasonal fruit and yogurt
Swiss cheese, pepper-coated salami and ham cold plate
Assorted breads including cinnamon and crusty rolls and warm croissants with butter and strawberry preserves
Fresh gourmet roasted regular and decaffeinated coffee made exclusively for Continental Airlines or tea with your choice of milk or lemon

It’s tough flying business 😉 But I do realise that it is really a question of “enjoying it while it lasts” because once we move back to Europe there won’t be anymore free business travels across the Atlantic!

Leaving Puerto Rico by sunrise in January

Joking aside, please keep your fingers crossed for me – I have one hour in Newark so I can’t have any no delays between San Juan and the mainland… or I might have to wait 24 hours to catch the next flight to Copenhagen!?

Wednesday recipe & etiquette: O’s Yummy Sandwiches and the same dress twice

Since I am busy packing for Europe and preparing the apartment for our next visitors, O’s brother C and German girlfriend G who will arrive one day earlier than us to San Juan end of July, the Wednesday recipe will be very short and concise:

O has become an expert sandwich maker in the last 4 years and he is in charge of making our breakfast sandwiches on the weekends. He is a sandwich artist!! Always using cucumber and tomatoes for decoration, he has completely adopted the Swedish way of making sandwiches, however using olive oil instead of butter:

O’s yummy sandwiches
– whole grain bread, lightly toasted (since I broke our toaster we nowadays use a grill pan on the stove – even better than a toaster!)
– a flavourful cheese, such as Manchego – we love a rosemary goat’s cheese that we buy in Costco or why not just some slices of Brie
– salami / chorizo / ham
– thin slices of cucumber and tomato
– olive oil, O’s spicy olive oil for example
– salt & pepper

Pour a little olive oil on each toasted bread slice. Add the tomato and cucumber slices, salt and pepper and finally the cheese or sandwich meat. Enjoy!

O has a different way of putting the vegetables first and then the cheese / meat on the sandwiches. It actually tastes really great as the bread gets more of a flavour from the tomato juices combined with the olive oil.

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And for this week’s etiquette question (from DNs Etikettfrågan):
Would you wear the same dress* twice?

Of course you probably would, if you are not extremely rich and wasteful. But let’s say that you have been invited to two weddings the same summer and more or less the same guests will be expected to both weddings, would you then wear the same dress to both weddings? It is an interesting issue, which I find only applies to us women – men can wear the same suit to all weddings, parties and even funerals, maybe just changing the tie and shirt.

This summer I only have one wedding, but we have been invited to another one with the same group of friends, but unfortunately we won’t be able to make it to Ireland in August for my dear friend O’s wedding. However, for many summers in a row I had several weddings but I always managed to avoid this issue by the fact that there were different guests at each event. I also have a few different dresses that I can choose from for every wedding as I definitely recycle outfits. For my friends who are going to attend both weddings this summer, I doubt that they will wear the same dresses for both events but I am actually going to ask them next week when we meet in Strasbourg!

Maybe if I had such an amazing dress I would wear it twice in a row 😉

*) As most of my readers seem to be women…

A Swedish Midsummer’s Picnic in Puerto Rico

There are not many Swedes living in Puerto Rico, and there is no Swedish network to find the few that live here. However, over the course of 1½ years we have found a few – mostly by coincidence. The first Swede I actually found before we moved here – on the Swedish expat website called Sviv.se (Svenskar i Världen) and she, B, has become our best friend in Puerto Rico.
B had heard of a famous Swede in Caguas, who runs a coffee shop and one Sunday the three of us drove there to try to find her. Unfortunately J wasn’t working that day but we had a delicious cup of coffee and got her phone number.
In August O and I found another Swede on the parking lot by the big mall through the Swedish flag sticker on his car (even though it was his Puerto Rican wife that we met first). Last Christmas this Swede, G and his wife invited us for a Christmas fika at their place and there we met Swedish J – expert in making Jansson’s frestelse (a traditional dish with potato and anchovies). The director of the Alliance Francaise told me a few weeks ago that he had “found me a Swede” – it turned out to be half-Swede / half-French A and then one of O’s colleagues told us that his cousin was married to a Swede…

B and I decided that it was time to gather all these random Swedes together, and what not better than for a Midsummer celebration! We invited all the Swedes we knew or didn’t know*, and our other local and international friends for a picnic on Saturday, and prayed to the Weather gods that it wouldn’t rain…

Here are some photos:

The view of the picnic location was breath-taking – over the Escambrón beach, the Old San Juan with its San Cristobal fortress and el Capitolio

We set up a big table under the shade of the palm trees and the guests started arriving. In the end we were almost 40 adults and kids from Sweden, Puerto Rico, US, Spain, Belgium, France, Germany, Peru, and Venezuela – a wonderful mix of people and as I pointed out – nobody knew everybody!

A rainy picnic… Unfortunately it started pouring down, in typical Swedish Midsummer fashion, just when we were going to eat – holding a plate and an umbrella and eating at the same time is a little difficult!! Nevertheless, all the guests stayed cheerful and optimistic! Everybody said that “what’s a little rain” – a very Swedish attitude actually…

All the guests brought food and we had pickled herring, Jansson’s temptation, meatballs, potato salad, beetroot salad, pasta salad, Västerbotten (Swedish cheese) Quiche, Smörgåstårta (Sandwich cake), Strawberry cake, Carrot Cake…

The Jansson’s temptation gratin got a little wet…

Probably the best strawberry cake I have ever eaten – B had done a tremendous job with making both the Smörgåstårta and the Jordgubbstårta!

A Midsummer Quiz about Sweden – Questions included how to say Sweden in Spanish (as people keep confusing Suiza (Switzerland) with Suecia (Sweden)), the name of the Swedish king and the average temperature in Stockholm in July… None of the Swedes managed to answer all the questions correctly but Spanish F and Puerto Rican M did!!

The Dance of the Small Frogs is quite fitting for Puerto Rico since the Coquí frog is a symbol of the country. Unfortunately we didn’t have a may pole but a Swedish flag was good enough to dance around

You can’t hear a lot of singing going on but most of the dancers got the frog jumping down…

I had made a “Sångblad” with the lyrics to the Small Frogs in both Swedish and English, as well as the snaps song “Helan går” in Swedish and “phonetic” English… No, we are not really singing about “Hell and Gore” when drinking snaps in Sweden 😉

After the rain the sun came out and then slowly set over the sea behind the palm trees… And then the vicious mosquitoes decided to feast on us! 😕

A Puerto Rican Midsummer sunset – over on the beach a wedding was taking place in the light of the setting sun

Oh, and nowadays there is a small network of Swedes in Puerto Rico – on Facebook! Hopefully we will organise a crayfish / shrimp party in August – with the 3-4 missing Swedes who couldn’t make it to the Midsummer picnic.

*) One of the Swedes who we didn’t actually know was a Swedish girl who contacted me through the blog a few weeks ago. She is in Puerto Rico for only a month while doing a yoga instructor course and I told her to come by our home whenever she had some time off. On Saturday she showed up 5 minutes before we leaving for the picnic so I told her to join us – talk about perfect timing!

Friday theme / Show & tell: Summer day / evening

Only two Friday themes left chosen by Annika and Desiree, unfortunately I missed last Friday’s theme which was “a 6-month photo review”. Today’s theme is “Summer day / evening” which is fitting as today is Midsummer’s Eve in Sweden! Next week the theme is “The light of the city” and then we take a break until September.

I wanted to write about summer evenings, but then I recalled that I wrote a post about that topic last year…

Summer nights in Sweden need to be experienced – they have a special light, also in the south of the country where the midnight sun doesn’t shine, and the nights are very short – especially in June and July…

This is one of my all time favourites among my photos! My parents and I were on our way home on our bikes from a dinner with friends. It was the 27th July and probably around 10 o’clock at night and the mist was creeping up from the river…

So, maybe I should write about a summer day instead? I am going home to Sweden next Thursday and I am, of course, already planning what I want to do:

Wake up relatively early in the morning. Maybe walk to the baker’s trailer by the camping to buy some fresh rolls. Fetch the newspaper from the mail box on my way back. Prepare breakfast and settle down on the deck to read the newspaper while eating. I will read almost every article in the paper – I savour every opportunity to read the actual paper version instead of reading in front of the computer!

After breakfast I will do the dishes, no dish-washer in the summer house – that would almost be a sacrilege! Summer houses are supposed to be simple. In our old summer house we didn’t have hot water in the kitchen for many years and we had to take a small bucket to the bathroom to get hot water for the dishes.

Maybe my sister and I will take the bikes to Åhus – cycling along the bike path through the forest. My friend P No 1 (who is getting married in two weeks’ time in Strasbourg) and I did a similar excursion last year. In Åhus we will check out the flea market shops, the designer shop called Percy’s and have an ice cream on the Ice Cream Boat. I wonder if they will have my favourite flavours Citronmaräng and Knäck this summer as well? On our way back we might choose to visit Äspets Rökeri, a smokehouse run by a friendly Dane, to buy some warm smoked salmon and mackerel.

Not the ice cream on the boat but good enough

When returning home we won’t be very hungry after the big ice cream but we will make a light lunch with salad, Lingongrova (my favourite Swedish bread) and smoked mackerel.

In the afternoon my sister will go to the beach as she is almost as sun-loving as our mother. I might join her, or decide to stay around the house to read in the hammock. It is so peaceful to rock back and forth in the hammock, listening to the wind in the pine trees, the occasional car driving by on the road and people walking to the beach, so after a while I will put down the book and have a nap instead.

By the beach – the colour of this small house reminds me of the Caribbean

All of a sudden it starts to rain, and my sister comes rushing home from the beach. We gather inside and play a game of Skitgubbe (card game) while the rain pours down outside.

The smoked salmon will be dinner tomorrow night, and instead we make a barbeque dinner with oven-baked new potatoes. My father will stress us to have the meat ready when the coals are just right to put the skewers / kebabs on the grill.

After dinner my sister, mother and I go for a walk – heading down towards the sea, turn north and walk along the beach, passing the fisherman’s cabin and then walk west on the winding road. We walk past the summer houses painted in different colours while the sun is setting ahead of us. Just before the main road we turn to the left onto the trail / bike path where my sister and I cycled this morning. We meet a few people walking their dogs and we say hello, not because we know them but because you always greet people when in the countryside / forest. The evening walk is the perfect ending to a summer day in the summer house in Sweden… In one week’s time I will be there!

Here are the other Friday bloggers:
Anki, Anna, Annika, Christel, Curieux, Desiree, Emma, Erica, IamAnnika, IngaBritt, Jemaya, Lena W, Leopardia, Mais-oui, Marie, Mia D, Millan, Minerva, Moster Mjölgumpa, Musikanta, Nilla, Norrsken & Stjärnfall, Petra H, Saltis, Sara, Simone, Sparkling, Strandmamman, Taina, Under Ytan, Victoria V and Västmanländskan.

We are not celebrating Midsummer’s Eve today, but tomorrow we are having a Swedish Midsummer picnic by the beach! Swedish B and I have invited the Swedes we know in Puerto Rico, including one guy who we haven’t met yet as he lives in Ponce, and other friends, both local and international. Let’s hope we are luckier with the weather than the Midsummer’s Eve party in Sweden last year… It is after all the rainy season in the Caribbean and it rains almost every day!

Wednesday recipe & survey: Spicy Olive oil & sheet etiquette

One of the Swedish newspapers that I read, Dagens Nyheter or DN for short, has an etiquette column written by a famous etiquette expert called Margareta Ribbing. I find it absolutely fascinating to read the questions sent in by readers, the answers written by Margareta and the sometimes outrageous debates that follow through the readers’ comments.

Maybe I have been away too long from Sweden and have gotten used to adapting to foreign cultures with different traditions, or maybe I am completely oblivious to the trail of insulted Swedes and foreigners I leave behind me?? Nevertheless, I am often astounded by the etiquette issues people have. You would assume that common sense and communication would be enough to solve most problems – especially when living in a relatively homogenous society such as Sweden. Why not actually ask people what they expect from you – do they want you to take off your shoes or not, split the restaurant bill or calculate everyone’s share by the decimal…

I found this quite unusual sign in a condo in San Juan

I don’t know if this is a typically Swedish phenomenon or if people all over the world encounter the same dilemmas in everyday life? We usually say that we Swedes are so afraid of confrontation and making fools out of ourselves, is that why etiquette is so important? I am not saying that etiquette wouldn’t be important abroad, but are Swedes more anxious to not make etiquette blunders?

And do you expats, Swedish or not, find it easier or more difficult to interact with your countrymen after having lived abroad? And how do you deal with etiquette issues with people in your adoptive country? Sometimes it might be easier to be a foreigner and blame your faux pas on that!? Are the so-called unwritten rules in Sweden stricter than abroad?

My new idea for the Wednesday posts is that I will continue publishing recipes but also polls on etiquette to see how you reason around these, at least in Sweden, hotly contested etiquette dilemmas! I know that most of my readers, or at least the ones that comment, are Swedish expats but let’s see if we all agree or disagree with Margareta Ribbing and her readers… Every Wednesday I will choose one of the questions from Etikettfrågan (The Etiquette Question) for you to vote on. Let the debate begin!

The first etiquette question:
Do you bring your own sheets & towels when you stay at friends’ places (this is a link to the original question in Dagens Nyheter – in Swedish of course)?

Do you assume that if the host doesn’t mention sheets, it means that you should bring your own stuff? Or the other way around? Does it matter if you are visiting friends in a summerhouse (maybe without a washing machine) or at their permanent home? Do you even bring your own pillow and duvet? In other words, what is your sheet & towel principle?

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And now to the Wednesday recipe, which once again is one of O’s recipes! One of the many reasons why I love my O is that he is a great cook, I find that very attractive in a man! We both enjoy cooking, and as you might have guessed by now from the recipes I publish, we prefer simple recipes. This is not a recipe for an actual dish but can serve as a future ingredient in all kinds of dishes – salads, frying meat, fish or vegetables…

O’s Spicy Olive Oil
– a clean empty glass bottle
– olive oil
– fresh herbs – for example rosemary or thyme
– a few peeled cloves of garlic
– sundried tomatoes and / or a few small dried chilis
– peppercorns, preferably a mix of red and black etc

Put all the ingredients in the glass bottle and add olive oil. After just a day or so the oil will have a wonderful flavour from the spices and herbs!

NB. I found that the rosemary sprig that sticks up in the air above the oil level started to grow mould – so it is probably better if you don’t use entire sprigs of rosemary (i.e cut them in smaller pieces) or regularly add more oil.

Réveille tes sens – the Perfume Event

Since I came back to Puerto Rico end of March, I have been working for the Alliance Française on the organisation and preparation for an event called “Réveille tes sens” (Awake or arouse your senses). My colleague, who has also become a great friend, M from Peru, and I have worked 3-4 afternoons a week with preparing press releases, writing sponsor letters and meeting with potential sponsors etc. It has been a very interesting project for both of us especially as we didn’t have any previous experience of public relations work. We have had lots of fun while “learning by doing” and practising our Spanish (me) and French (M).

The event took place last week with a press conference and two so-called conferences + 3-course dinners at Bistro de Paris, a fancy French restaurant here in San Juan. Our collaborator and co-sponsor from Lancôme told us that we should be very happy with the press conference – we had representatives from the island’s main newspapers and magazines, plus one TV-station and an English-speaking radio station present to hear the perfumer Christophe Laudamiel talk about his fascinating work as creator of perfumes.

The journalists and participants of the event received small perfume echantillons (samples) of the Lancôme perfume Magnifique, and the smelling strips were handed out by yours truly during the presentation…

Both Wednesday and Thursday evening Christophe made his presentation to captivated audiences, before we all enjoyed a delicious dinner and culminated the soirées with a tombola / lottery. The prizes had been donated by luxury brands and boutiques such as Gucci, Cartier, Coach, Godiva as well as local establishments (a clothing shop, a spa and a fitness centre). It was great to see how the guests were enjoying themselves thanks to our hard work and also to read about the event in the local newspapers.

After having heard Christophe speak three times, I was still utterly fascinated by his world of scents and fragrances. He referred to the book “The Perfume, a story of a murderer” by Patrick Süskind as a bible for the perfume industry – not because of the murder story but because it so well describes smells and their influence on our everyday lives. I read the book a few years ago, and it is a fascinating but also disgusting story that doesn’t leave any reader indifferent… Christophe Laudamiel actually created a set of perfumes for the adaptation of the book to film and you can read more about that in this blog post*. I haven’t seen the film yet but happened to be in Barcelona (representing Paris in the 18th century) when they were filming parts of the film there 3 years ago.

Not the most exciting photo from a film shoot but this alley in Barcelona had been prepped for filming – if you look carefully you can see piles of dirt that were put there to hide traces of modern days – electrical outlets, sewage etc. I don’t know what they did with the still visible electrical wiring and graffiti though…

I will write more about the content of Christophe’s presentations another day; I had no idea that the world of perfumes could be so interesting!

*) Check out this blog which is written by a friend of Anna Fair and True, Marina Geigert, who works with perfumes.

Wednesday recipe: A super easy chicken & rice lunch

What a busy week I have! O is on a business trip to New Jersey – I am hoping that he will come home with some news about our future… He did ask me if I wanted to join him and visit New York City during the days when he works, but to my disappointment this is the first week ever in Puerto Rico that I need to be here!! Talk about bad timing! Hopefully he will go back in August and I will get to join him!
Since I came back from Europe in March I have been working on a project for the Alliance Francaise which culminates tonight and tomorrow night with two perfume events. A famous French perfumer (creator of perfumes), Christophe Laudamiel has come to give presentations on the sense of smell and the perfume industry, and afterwards the participants will be served a three-course meal in a fancy French restaurant. We had the press conference this morning and it was absolutely fascinating to listen to the perfumer!! I took notes like a mad journalist and hope to find time to write a blog post as soon as possible. In the meanwhile, I hope you like this improvised super easy lunch recipe that I threw together a few weeks ago.

Canned fried red peppers (pimientos) are a staple in the Spanish kitchen – try frying them with some sliced onion and serve with meat

My super easy chicken & rice lunch (or dinner) for one
1 chicken breast, newly fried or cold left-over (fried with salt, pepper and some herbs such as basil or oregano)
1 portion of rice, newly cooked or cold left-over
1 small can of fried red peppers
a few tablespoons of pesto
a few tablespoons of French Dijon mustard

Mix together the pesto and mustard (you might recognise this mixture from my pesto salmon recipe – I love it!!). Cut the red pepper into small pieces and mix with the rice. Slice the fried chicken breast and place on top of the rice. Spread the pesto-mustard mixture on the chicken. If you are using cold left-overs, microwave for 1-1½ minute before serving!

A really colourful lunch!

Bilingual and bi-cultural, is that a problem? Part III

I am finally sitting down to write the third post about bilingual and bi-cultural relationships, the first and second parts touched upon the subject of bilingualism. Today’s topic is bi-culturalism:

Yesterday I thought about culture twice; first when O came home from a morning photography walk telling me that it was the San Juan Gay Parade and that we should go and have a look, and then a second time when I suggested that we have an early sushi dinner at 6 o’clock in the evening (afternoon for O)…

The San Juan Gay Parade

A new relationship is always exciting; getting to know each other and figuring out personalities, interests, opinions, and values. When the relationship is bi-cultural, the differences can seem much bigger and more surprising – or maybe not, it all depends on the attitude. If you start any relationship, but especially a bi-cultural relationship, focusing on differences, then you will of course find differences. However, if you choose to focus on common denominators instead, I believe that the differences will be seen as fewer and more positive.

This was definitely the most beautiful costume yesterday – I was a little jealous!

For me the key is common values! O and I haven’t really had any major cultural misunderstandings or clashes, maybe because we met in a third country; Belgium where we were both foreigners. When we met, we had lived 5 (O) respectively 3 (me) years in Brussels so I guess we were already used to compromising when it came to culture. Our strongest national traits might have already been sandpapered down a little, adjusted to living, dating and working in a multicultural environment and therefore less obvious…

“All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights” on the Amnesty International banner. Unfortunately there was also a banner (at the side of the street) protesting against “the sin of homosexuality” but I don’t want to publish that one…

However, living abroad is no guarantee that you will be open to new cultures and traditions – I have seen many Swedes, Spaniards and French who, despite living abroad, have not been the least interested in compromising language, culture or plans for the future with a foreign partner. Many times the defining factor is why you moved abroad – was it an active choice or by necessity (not finding a job in your own country, being sent abroad by a company, trailing spouse…)? People who choose voluntarily to move abroad are usually more interested in getting to know other cultures while the “forced” expats focus on finding friends, partners and activites among their own. If they then happen to meet a foreigner and fall in love, they show less curiosity for the other person’s culture and rather an inclination to try to convert their new partner to become more Swedish, Spanish or French. Needless to say, these relationships will be prone to culture clashes, misunderstandings and one-sided compromises. In the long run they don’t usually last…

For me it is difficult to understand how a person, who claims to be in love with somebody, can show a complete disinterest in getting to know that someone’s cultural background! It is the same as saying that you are really not that interested in getting to know that person. Culture is such a big part of our personalities – whether we like it or not! I wouldn’t say that O is a typical Spaniard, and I would probably not be described as a typical Swede but we are still influenced by our nationalities and cultural backgrounds.

So getting back to why I thought of culture yesterday:

Despite that O grew up in a big catholic family in a small town in the middle of the Spanish countryside with little exposure to travelling, different cultures and languages, he is one of the open persons I know. And even though we come from two very different European countries, it has turned out that our core values are the same. I thought that enjoying the pride and excitement of a gay parade together with O was quite illustrative of our common values! We believe in everybody‘s equal rights and opportunities, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, nationality, cultural background… Nothing revolutionary really, but unfortunately still not something that you can take for granted, not everybody agrees with the universalism of the human rights.

The second time I thought of culture yesterday was when we went out for an early dinner – extremely early for a Spaniard who would typically never eat before 9 o’clock in the evening when at home in Spain… Regarding dinner times, we have actually had a few disagreements – I believe that it is ok to have an early dinner, especially on the weekends – sometimes even merging lunch and dinner (if breakfast & lunch is brunch, is lunch & dinner “lundi” or maybe “lunchdi”?)! I asked O yesterday if it felt weird to have had both dinner and drinks and to be heading home at 20.15 – he said yes, but added that it was quite practical as he needed to pack for his early business trip departure this morning.

Pretty in pink – and thirsty!

I think the secret to a happy bi-cultural relationship, just like bilingualism, is to show interest – you don’t have to embrace all the cultural traditions of your partner’s country, just like you don’t have to learn to speak his / her language perfectly -but learn at least the most basic words and expressions! A little cultural compromise goes a long way! In the future we will probably take turns in celebrating la fiesta de San Juan in O’s hometown* in Spain, and Midsummer’s Eve in Sweden, participate in Spanish Easter processions but have Swedish Easter eggs, and of course Christmas will be spent alternating between Spain and Sweden**!

Spanish Easter Procession. NB The blood stains on the drum – the drummer shows his devotion by beating the drum until he bleeds…

Swedish Easter Egg filled with sweets – a more relaxed way of celebrating Easter

I think that there will be yet another post on bi-culturalism as I still have lots to say – hope you are still interested in reading my thoughts on the matter… And let me know what you think!

*) Isn’t it typical that of all the saints, Saint John has to be one of the patron saints of O’s village, whose celebration just happens to be coincide with the biggest cultural tradition in Sweden – Midsummer’s Eve!
**) I just hope that we can try to time the Swedish Christmas with my other friends who live abroad (Norway, Denmark and France) with foreign partners…

If you are European and you aren’t going to vote…

…you should be ashamed of yourself*!!!

There is no excuse – nobody who reads any newspaper and / or watches the news can have missed that the European elections are taking place tomorrow**. I just can’t believe one survey made in Sweden which claims that 1 out of 4 Swedish voters do not know about the elections!
My busy friend Å in Copenhagen wrote on her Facebook status the other day: “[I] took a two minutes detour for democracy while rushing between work and kindergarten and speed-voted for the European Parliament. So anyone claiming “I did not have time to vote” will need to look for another argument…”
If you have other excuses why you are not voting – check out this blog (in Swedish) for some reasons why you should vote!

If you are still wondering how the European Parliament and its elections work – check out this FAQs on BBC News, information in Swedish here and this link to the European Parliament itself.

The European Parliament in Brussels

We are 375 million Europeans in 27 countries to vote for the European Parliament, which means that it is the biggest “trans-national election in history” (according to BBC News) and if that isn’t a reason enough to exercise your right to vote, consider that TODAY (6th June) the 65th anniversary of D-Day was celebrated in Normandie! See how far we have come with European integration since that day in 1944! Think of that and don’t tell me that the European Union isn’t important!

The Berlaymont building in Brussels which houses the European Commission

Why are Swedes such Euro-sceptics together with the British? Well, I think that it is very much a problem of how we look at Europe – as the Continent, or in other words as them, not us. We don’t feel as European as a Belgian, German, Italian or French. In most countries on the Continent the European flag always flies next to the national flag, and people cross borders and use Euros without considering it “travelling abroad” anymore…

The City Hall in Aix-en-Provence, France flies the European flag

The City Hall in Zaragoza, Spain with the European flag

The European flag outside a theatre in Lisbon, Portugal

My 89-year old grandfather is one of the anti-EU Swedes (but according to my father he has already voted!) and I think for his generation in Sweden it is a question of fear – they remember the mess of the Second World War, which happened mostly on the Continent and not in Sweden (even though both Norway and Finland were very much involved). So, while Europeans his age remember the war and therefore support the European idea, he and his generation in Sweden still want to keep out to avoid involvement.

American war monument in Bastogne, Belgium

What I can’t understand is that the younger generation is still sceptical – haven’t they realised the marvels of being able to travel, study and work anywhere in Europe? Not having to worry about visas and work permits…

Arrivals and departures at the Venice trainstation – cross-border trains to Geneva (not part of the EU) and Slovenia

And if you are one of the critics of the European Union, without exercising your democratic right (obligation!), I believe that you have no right to criticise – there are lots of Euro-critical parties to vote for!

I am European and I am proud of it! GO and VOTE!!

The European flag in Bruges, Belgium

*) In Swedish there is a saying that goes something like “you will never be a prophet in your own home[town]” and unfortunately O is one of the Europeans who hasn’t voted! I have told him that it is unforgiveable, especially as he has lived and studied / worked in two different European countries, and is married to another European! Without the European Union we probably never would have met…
**) Some member states, such as the UK and the Netherlands have already voted earlier this week.